


Turn It Off and On Again

by matchsticks_p (matchsticks)



Category: How to Get Away with Murder
Genre: Alternate Universe - Office, M/M, Rimming, don't get your hopes up, just wanted to cover my basis with warnings, minor mentions of finding painful sex pleasurable, surprise side plot about Asher and Connor's friendship, there is no explicit kink
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-09
Updated: 2014-12-09
Packaged: 2018-02-28 20:35:00
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,164
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2746115
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/matchsticks/pseuds/matchsticks_p
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A ten-thousand word office AU, written for the prompt "Connor really does work at the bank across the street and his idiot coworker, Asher, keeps getting viruses on their computer by downloading porn. Eventually, the bank borrows some IT guys from the advertizing firm across the street, including Oliver. Connor tries to ask Oliver out, but Oliver mistakenly thinks Connor is straight (because of Asher's porn). So, Connor starts infecting the office computers with more viruses to get another excuse to talk to Oliver and try again."</p><p>It isn't exactly like that, but it sort of is exactly like that.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Turn It Off and On Again

Months later, against his better judgement, Connor tells Asher the story of the first time he hooked up with Oliver. 

"Wait, so he came to fix all our computers because you _seduced_ him?" Asher asks incredulously, because he's terrible at listening. That isn't what Connor said _at all_.

"No, that isn't what I said at all," he protests. "The seducing was just sort of incidental. How do you not remember this? It was literally all your fault. He had already helped us before I even did anything. He was just so—there was something between us, just, chemistry or something, and one thing led to another and honestly, I don't even know why I bother telling you things. Every single time I think you might understand something, you go and prove me wrong."

"That was a bit of overkill, don't you think?" Asher goes on like he didn't hear Connor. "I mean, it was just some viruses, I'm sure we would've found some other IT firm to deal with it eventually, you didn't need to sleep with a guy just to make our emails stop bouncing."

And of course, because Connor's life is a fucking joke, Oliver chooses that moment to clear his throat and announce his presence in their break room.

It's really the sort of thing that only happens in novels, or movie adaptations thereof—someone walks in at just the precisely wrong time in a conversation and only hears a small, misleading bit of it, leading them to think that something's going on when in reality an entirely different thing is going on. It's a cliché when it happens in a novel (or movie adaptation thereof). It's downright unbelievable when it happens in real life.

Just to double check, Connor asks in a very small voice, "How long have you been standing there?"

In an equally small voice, although one that rapidly gains in anger towards the end of his sentence, Oliver says, "Just long enough to hear you fucked me so your emails would send again."

Connor rushes out after Oliver, cursing Asher the whole time. It's always fucking Asher who gets him into these messes. It's completely, entirely unfair. That's not even close to what happened at all, and now Oliver thinks it is because Asher is an utter douchehole who deserves his lonely friendless existence.

*** SIX MONTHS EARLIER ***

"Initial here, here, and here, and then there's just this one last page for you to read and sign before you're all good to go," Connor says, demeanour calm on the outside while privately cheering on the inside. He hasn't been working here for very long and is already about to celebrate his 50th successful negotiation. At this rate, by this time next year, he'll be promoted to senior loan officer, which is almost unheard of for someone his age.

As soon as his clients have left with copies of their signed papers in hand, Wes, Michaela, and Laurel burst into his office blowing noisemakers and throwing confetti with pink and blue glitter. Wes holds out a red velvet cupcake piled high with fluffy white frosting and a lighted candle perched at the top, and makes him blow it out. "Congratulations on the big five oh!" he all but yells. 

It isn't entirely professional, but the sentiment is appreciated and Connor eats the frosting off his cupcake with a smug satisfaction that hopefully covers up how actually sappy he's feeling in this moment. He's done it. He made it into Wharton School of Business when his parents were seriously doubtful he'd even graduate high school, he graduated top of his class, he landed this job before he even wrote his last final exam, and now he's obviously secured his future at this bank. He's fucking done it. It's all been a rush, like a rollercoaster on fast forward, but now here he is, celebrating with co-workers that he might even call friends.

Wes had been nice to him right off the bat, as soon as he joined the team, because that's just how Wes is. It took Connor a while to warm up to him in return because his immediate friendliness made Connor feel both suspicious and exasperated. He doesn't like people who might have ulterior motives, but he likes it so much less when they don't. People who are just soft inside hold no interest for him. But then he figured out Wes's deal. As soon as he realized that Wes actually does have an edge to him, despite his friendliness, Connor finds himself liking him quite a bit. Wes works as a teller, which is probably the least glamorous job at the company, janitorial staff included, but he and Connor are surprisingly similar in a lot of ways—Wes has also had to work against a whole lot of people not believing in him in order to get to where he is today, and even though he's a few steps below him on the ladder, Connor can already tell that he's going to work his way up to the top someday, just like him.

After Connor's first few days, Laurel had decided to follow Wes's lead and be nice to him too. Connor's still not entirely sure if she would've been friendly to him if it weren't for Wes. She's much more guarded than Wes, which isn't saying much because so is the entire rest of the world, but she may even be more guarded than Connor himself. She isn't unkind, though, and even if Connor isn't close to her he's comfortable sharing the occasional laugh over an office in-joke with her.

Michaela is for sure unkind, not to anyone else really besides Connor. But she does it to tease and to insert a healthy sense of competition into their workplace relationship and Connor doesn't mind her well-timed barbs and jibes at all. He quite likes them. She speaks his language.

Those three people are basically the co-workers he speaks to the most on a daily basis, unless you count—

"Whoa whoa whoa whoa. Are you guys having a party in here?"

Asher.

Connor sighs and says no, no they are not.

"That's right you're not, because it's never a party without me!" Asher says, rolling into Connor's office still fully in his chair. The plastic wheels clack really, really loudly against the floor.

"Okay, but we really aren't," Connor says. "These three were just saying a quick congratulations since I closed my fiftieth deal. It isn't a party. We're all going to get back to work in a minute."

"But you can have a cupcake if you want," Wes offers brightly. 

Laurel makes a motion to stop him but she's too late, because Wes is holding out the box and Asher is already taking two—who takes two when offered _a_ cupcake?—and stuffing one of them fully into his mouth. 

"Mmmrrrffgghhhh-is' great," Asher says, spraying crumbs everywhere. In Connor's office. "Mmmmmnnnpphhhhnohyeah, congrats, buddy!"

Connor manages a thin smile in lieu of a thank you.

Michaela rolls her eyes extensively and exhales in one long, audible sigh before simply walking out without saying a further word to anyone. She really does speak his language.

Later that week, Connor gets his confirmation that Michaela sees him more as a dangerous rival than anything, an enemy she should keep closer than her friends. He's flattered, really.

"Are you _trying_ to get me fired?" Michaela hisses, storming into his office and slamming the door behind her. 

Connor is actually expecting a client pretty soon, so his door really needs to not be slammed shut and his office really needs to not have an angry Michaela in the middle of it. He has no time for a battle of wits. "Um...no?" he hazards to guess at the answer.

"I really think you're trying to get me fired," she repeats, and because they speak the same language, Connor can detect an undertone of admiration beneath her anger.

"As much as I would like to take credit for whatever's got your feathers ruffled, I honestly have no idea what you're talking about."

"So you're saying you didn't sign me up for a monthly subscription for erection pills?"

"......Come again?"

"Monthly. Subscription. The confirmation messages are being sent to my work email and the shipping information says my work address," Michaela says. "Some of the emails are addressed to a 'Dear Mr. Walsh,' though, so I figured you were trying to set me up to look like I was doing something really, really inappropriate at work and just didn't cover your tracks very well."

Connor gazes past her through the glass walls of his office to make sure his clients hadn't arrived, aren't sitting out in the waiting area listening to this ridiculous conversation. "First of all, how dare you suggest that I would ever do such a terrible job if I actually did want to set you up. If I hatched a scheme against you, you'd never find out it was me," he says. "Second of all, that's hilarious. And third of all, I honestly have no idea what you're talking about. I never signed you up for anything. And I've never looked at an 'erection pills' website in my life because trust me, I have no problems in that department." 

Michaela makes a deeply disgusted noise in the back of her throat.

"I take it as a compliment that I was the first person to come to mind when you thought 'who here is my nemesis,' I really do," Connor says. "But my two o'clock appointment is here so you have to go."

She narrows her eyes at him, but she's too good at her job to jeopardize client relationships, so she turns briskly and leaves.

As funny as the incident is, it could actually indicate a fairly serious security breach, and so when it happens again and again they report it to their IT department, and then promptly forget about it. Or, they try to forget about it, but by the next week their IT staff has finished conducting their investigation and has sent out an email accusing everybody of being disgusting perverts who look at pornography on company time.

To be fair, the company-wide email has a little more discretion than that, but it's what it basically boils down to. A Trojan virus has gotten into the network via a porn site, and the IT department is frankly disgusted because this is a respectable financial establishment and everybody is being paid much too well to be spending work time on this kind of obscenity and jeopardizing the security of their systems. Naturally, everyone protests that it's not them, and they kick up enough of a fuss that the IT department puts a little more effort into tracing the source. 

Absolutely nobody who knows him is surprised when patient zero turns out to be Asher.

"How are you this stupid?" Michaela demands, finally finding the right person to let out all her pent up erection pills ire on.

"Are you _sure_ you went to Wharton?" Connor asks. Asher's name was in the alumni publication when Connor got in. It's a rhetorical question. He still feels like he has to check, because this is so, so far beyond the realm of acceptable idiocy.

"Oh yeah, bro, just like my dad and my mom and my grandfather," Asher replies. He hasn't even said sorry about all the trouble he's caused yet.

Connor makes a face at that. He shouldn't be surprised that Asher is one of _those_ people, and he isn't, really, not if he puts some thought into it. It's just always sad to find out your co-worker is completely unperturbed about how under-qualified it is, especially when you actually take a lot of pride in your own position. "You're making us all look bad."

Wes has no input about the situation, because he's still mortified by the kind of porn Asher was looking at. He doesn’t seem ruffled by the concept of porn at work, much, but, "Why 'interracial squirting bodybuilders in chains,' exactly? It's so...specific. And I think kind of racist?" 

Asher just laughs and makes a lewd gesture by sticking out his tongue and flapping it.

Wes runs away. 

Maybe out of spite, or some sadistic need to teach them a lesson, or just maybe out of genuinely bad timing, the head of their IT department also runs away, not just temporarily but on two weeks' holiday. The bank can't very well just leave the problem of a gaping security breach for two weeks, so it's decided that they would pay for consultants from the fancy Internet start-up across the street to come in and fix it for them. They've worked on some system design things for the bank before, so it's not hard to negotiate this new relationship with them.

The guy they send over to assess the situation is _adorable_.

Connor doesn't usually go for adorable, because he likes people with teeth, people who'll burn you just for accidentally saying the wrong thing. And this guy, with his glasses and his skinny little tie and his permanent eye contact with the floor and his nervousness that manifests as _smiling_ , of all things, makes even Wes look as dangerous as a nuclear weapon. 

He introduces himself as Oliver, not to anybody in particular but just generally, to the floor. He pulls a rolly office chair up to Asher's desk and starts clicking around. Obviously fake but still completely indecent moaning starts blasting through the speakers, complete with high-pitched whimpers, throaty grunting, and wet slaps of skin against skin.

Oliver ignores safe exiting protocols and just slaps the power button on every goddamn thing he can reach.

"Um," he says, after he's recovered sufficiently to not look like he's going to die of mortification on the spot and just melt away into nothingness. "Um."

"Sorry about that," Asher says, sounding kind of like he doesn't even know what the word 'sorry' means. "I didn't know that was still on there."

"So. That's your problem right there," Oliver stammers, looking very carefully at the tips of his own shoes. "I mean, that you have all these porn files on the computer that you don't even know about, and also that you clearly have some kind of emotional problem that you should see a therapist about."

"How about I just tell you the names of all the sites I've visited, and you go through and figure out what all else could be on my computer, and I promise I'll never do it again," Asher says. He isn't even ashamed.

"Can I amend my last statement?" Oliver squeaks. "If I have to know all the sites you've visited, I'm probably the one who should go see a therapist."

Connor has to admit, in a twisted kind of way, that he respects Asher's utter lack of inhibitions and absolute inability to feel embarrassment. But what he really respects is how fucking hot Oliver is. He's adorable, yes, but even through his obvious discomfort in the situation he's snarking Asher like he can't help it. And as Connor watches him work quickly and efficiently excising viruses from their computers, he also realizes that he's clever and great at what he does. And the little grin he flashes when Connor catches his eyes once really doesn't help.

By the time the day is over, Connor is sort of in lust with this guy, but he misses his chance to make a move before he leaves. He's in with a client when Oliver finishes up, and by the time he gets out of his meeting Oliver has already gone.

He spends the next few days uncharacteristically obsessing over his new crush. The thing is, Connor Walsh doesn’t get crushes. Connor Walsh gets laid. There are so many hot people in the world who want him that he's never seen the point of pining after the ones he can't get. And yet here he is, trying to hatch some sort of scheme to get the IT guy back into their offices again so he can fix his egregious mistake of not getting his number the first time around.

"Do you really think that's the last we've seen of Asher's porn viruses?" he asks Laurel idly.

"Oh, are we doing this now? Is this a thing we do? Chatting without Wes?"

Connor makes a face at her. "It's work-related chat, don't get too far ahead of yourself."

She makes a face back. "I don't want to talk or think about Asher's porn."

"Hmm, fair enough."

It probably wouldn't be too hard to convince Asher to go to some other objectionable website and get their computers infected all over again, since it's been established that he's dumb as a bag of bricks and has about as much of a moral compass as said brick-bag, too. When he tries to hint at the topic, though, Asher interprets it as Connor asking him for porn _recommendations_ , and volunteers to compile a list of bookmarks for him, which...just. Nope. Abort plan. Abort abort abort.

Connor entertains, only very briefly, mad thoughts of downloading malware-riddled gay porn himself, just to make one hundred percent certain that Oliver would know he's gay if he has to come take care of their computers again. He'd never actually do it, because unlike Asher he does have scruples and company loyalty. It would jeopardize both his own position and the sensitive information of all of their clients too much. Still, the fact that the idea even floated into his head however briefly is proof that he weirdly fixated on that guy. 

He decides it's silly to be so hung up on a person he doesn't actually know, not really. Just because he had looked so cute when he pushed his glasses up, just because he had been so delightfully competent at his highly difficult job, doesn't mean that Connor should indulge in fantasies about touching the small of his back for any longer than one week, max. He's going to just move on, work it out of his system by picking up some other equally hot if not hotter guy, and let this hypothetical hot guy erase the lingering traces of his fascination with Oliver.

That Saturday night, he heads to his usual gay bar in the financial district, and seriously begins to reconsider his stance as a non-believer vis-à-vis the concept of fate.

Because Oliver is right fucking there.

Connor quickly turns away before Oliver sees him, ducks behind a large man carrying a tray of drinks, and runs a hand through his hair to spruce it up a little. He adjusts his tie so it's loose at his neck, unbuttons one more button than is strictly necessary. He wants to look casual, cool, relaxed. He wants to look like he hasn't been thinking about Oliver all week.

Once he's psyched himself up into the proper mindset, he saunters over to where Oliver is standing with a smell group of other men. 

Every single one of them, to a man, turns toward him and flashes him some sort of flirtatious look. It's exactly the kind of confidence-building ego boost Connor needs right now. One smiles and touches his elbow, while another asks his name, but neither of them is the one Connor wants attention from. Oliver, seeing his friends move in, seems to fade into himself, going quiet and backing off. 

"My name's Connor," Connor says in reply to the one who asked. He then turns the full force of the most charming smile he can muster up toward Oliver, but its effect is slightly neutralized by the fact that Oliver is mostly not looking up. "I actually work at the bank across the street from you, and I was hoping to ask Oliver here about something." He watches the tips of Oliver's ears slowly get pink. "Do you want to go get a drink?"

Connor ushers him away from the rest of the herd with a hand on the small of his back, finally satisfying a burning desire he's had all week to know how his palm would fit into the curve there. The answer is well. Gratifyingly well. 

"I, um, I remember you. Loan officer, right?" Oliver says over the thumping bass of the next song that starts up. Connor uses it as an excuse to lean his head in very, very close, even though he can hear him just fine.

"Good memory. Sorry about my co-worker, by the way. The one with all the porn. I don't fully understand why we even keep him around, but apparently his parents are important people and sometimes he's pretty entertaining to laugh at."

"It's okay. He still sounds better than my co-workers," he replies with a slight roll of his eyes.

Connor looks over at said co-workers, who all seem to be gossiping about them. Some of the looks they're sending their way seem too mocking to be entirely friendly, and Connor can't help the cocky sneer that creeps onto his face. Good. Let them eat their hearts out wondering why Connor chose Oliver.

"If you want to give them a show, we can start making out right here, right in front of them. Just say the word," he suggests to Oliver, only half joking.

Oliver laughs, and the sound sends a warm shiver of something right down Connor's spine. "Just ignore them. They like to make fun of me because I'm never able to say the right thing at the right time, especially not to...hot guys."

Oliver's ears are pinking up again, and Connor decides then that he wants to take him somewhere private, away from all the stupid trendy mood lighting so he can properly see the colour of Oliver's blush, and his eyes. After all, he did come out tonight with the objective of getting laid. How lucky for him that he'd be doing it with the guy he thought he would be trying to forget.

"That's funny, because you're a pretty hot guy yourself. Do you always say the wrong thing when you talk to yourself?"

Oliver laughs again. "I'm not..."

"Do you want to get out of here?"

Which is how they end up in Oliver's rather nicely furnished apartment, tangled in sweaty sheets with Connor's tongue up Oliver's ass and Oliver's fingers clenched trembling into his pillows. Connor had thought he would have to maybe sweet talk Oliver a lot more, gentle him like an easily spooked horse, spend most of the night on foreplay before Oliver would agree to the positively filthy things that Connor wants to do to him. But as soon as they had gotten back to Oliver's apartment, away from everyone out in public, in the comfort of his own home, Oliver had seemed to settle into his own skin so he no longer looked permanently uncomfortable. In the quiet cosiness of Oliver's kitchen, the air between them was easy. They traded kisses and jokes and it took practically no convincing at all for Oliver to rip off his shirt.

Every surprising new facet that Connor learns about Oliver just turns him on more.

He learns that Oliver fucking _loves_ being eaten out, shameless in his loud, breathy moans with every hot flick of Connor's tongue deeper and deeper into him. He learns that he's so responsive when he's past the point of no return that touching him literally anywhere, even the skin of his elbows or the backs of his knees, will get a quivering whimper. He learns that he can take a pounding like a champ, both in the mouth and in the ass. Every time Connor tries to pull back, give him some space to breathe or some time to adjust, Oliver just gets impatient and pulls his hips down twice as hard. And he learns that afterward, when they finally get their heart rates back down to somewhat normal after they just can't go anymore, Oliver's the type of guy who'll get up and clean them both off with a warm towel before putting his boxers back on for a putter around the apartment.

"What are you doing?" Connor asks when he stops feeling too boneless to make it off the bed. He trails out of the bedroom to follow Oliver around.

"Watering my plants," Oliver says, like that is at all a normal answer.

"Do you...need help?"

Oliver grins at him like he's the most precious wee thing in the world. Connor's pretty sure he's got it backwards. "No, you just sit down right here," he says, pushing Connor down onto the sofa.

Connor goes down easy. His legs are still feeling a bit like jelly after what they've done. He has no idea where Oliver's getting all this energy from.

"I've put the kettle on to boil," Oliver adds, as he shuffles back and forth between his ferns and cactuses. "Do you want tea or coffee? I've got a French press, you can have anything."

"I think it's a little late for coffee, isn't it?" Connor mumbles dreamily from amongst the couch cushions. He's too tired to be bothered by how surreal this conversation feels. It's not like he hadn't always suspected, in the back of his mind, that Oliver's truly one of a kind.

"I have decaf. Or, it can wake you up and you can get your second wind..." A bit of the old shyness slides back into Oliver's voice, unsure about whether his proposition would be welcome.

Connor wants to assure him that it's very, very welcome. "Alright, caffeine me up," he says, rubbing his eyes. "It's Sunday tomorrow anyways, we can wear ourselves out all night and then sleep in til noon."

Connor never does this with one night stands, but it's totally worth it for the smile that blooms across Oliver's face as he realizes that means Connor plans to stay the night and well into the next day.

* * *

At work on Monday, Wes calls Michaela over for help with a pinched faced, looking tight-lipped and embarrassed. Michaela is their designated acting team leader for the week, since Bonnie has flown off to some professional development conference and left her in charge. Connor follows her over to Wes's station because he has nothing important going on at the moment and he's burning with curiosity to know what could put that look on the impossibly easy-going Wes's face.

Michaela stops so suddenly that Connor almost runs into her back. He looks up to see what made her stop short, and sees what's on Wes's computer screen. Connor is no prude by any stretch of the imagination, but even he slaps a hand over his mouth to stifle a gasp. Or, to be more honest, probably to stifle a laugh.

"Wesley Gibbins," Michaela hisses, "why is that on your computer?"

"I don't know! I opened an email and it popped up and now I can't close it! It won't let me click on anything and it won't go away!"

"Clients are going to see!"

Connor reaches over and taps the monitor's power button. The screen goes from absolutely horrifying to soothingly black.

"Oh. Right," Wes says sheepishly. "Should've done that."

Having saved them from the danger of clients accidentally seeing images of a woman in a Viking costume inserting an obscene assortment of objects that have no business being up her, Connor smirks smugly.

"Wipe that look of your face," Michaela orders. "This is serious. It means our computer system is still infected."

"Or, that Asher has managed to infect it with something new," Wes points out.

Michaela makes a pained sound and pinches the bridge of her nose.

"Don't worry, I know a guy who can help," Connor says, mostly just to be funny. He's pretty sure they would hire Oliver to fix it again even if he didn't have his number now. It's just nice to have an excuse to be able to call him again so soon.

They get Oliver over right away, and it doesn't take him long to solve the problem. He also sets up a company-wide website blocker to keep them from accidentally wandering into dangerous territory again, and then customizes a specific and much more stringent version of the blocker for Asher's computer to prevent him from deliberately wandering into dangerous territory again.

All in all, it barely takes Oliver two hours to complete, and Connor is enough of a professional to refrain from touching him in his place of work, even though he looks irresistible in his skinny blue tie and slightly crumpled white shirt today. He might shoot him a few heated longing glances, but it's okay because Oliver returns at least half of them, and when Oliver's on his way out Connor falls into step beside him briefly, only for long enough to quickly whisper, "Dinner tonight. I'll take you out."

From the way they had said their reluctant goodbyes on Sunday, Connor had guessed that Oliver half thought he'd never see him again, at least outside of work. Connor would normally take full advantage of that excellent exit strategy, an escape from commitment, wide open and right in front of him. But instead, he finds himself wanting to reassure Oliver that he wants more, that he wants to see him again...and not just to make Oliver happy. He actually wants it, for himself. 

Oliver looks pleased, but also more than a little surprised, but he hurriedly says yes before Connor casually walks away again as though nothing happened.

Michaela catches his eye because she sees everything like a damn hawk, or a stalker, and flashes him something between a frown and a smirk.

Of course it's just his luck that the one time he actually wants to take a guy out properly, his plans get waylaid almost as soon as he makes them.

Their manager, Annalise, informs them that she expects them all to stay working late into the night to make up for all the lost hours of work that the computer problems have caused. It's a busy time in the fiscal cycle and they can't afford to fall behind. Only the senior staff have to stay, of course—everyone else can leave since they wouldn't be servicing clients after hours. But everyone else is expected to work overtime tonight to make sure they stay on schedule. Annalise holds a hand up when the protests begin to rise and they all fall instantly silent. 

She raises her eyebrow. "You know who to blame for this, and it isn't me," she says flatly, before walking away.

So then they turn all their anger on Asher, obviously.

There's a strange emotion on Asher's face, and it takes Connor a long time to identify it. It's shame, and it looks out of place because none of them have ever seen it on him before.

"I didn't mean to, not this time. I know you all think I'm, like, evil, but I'm not actually a government-programmed android sent to destroy this company from the inside. It was just a mistake. One of those websites sent me an email to confirm that I unsubscribed, and I clicked it without thinking. It was dumb. I should've told someone as soon as it happened, but I was too embarrassed and I was just hoping that maybe it would just blow over and nothing would happen."

To his horror, Connor finds himself feeling for the guy. The last thing he wants is to empathize with _Asher_ , of all people. But he looks so genuinely remorseful, and everyone is standing around him like an angry mob encircling a victim. Not that Asher could ever be mistaken for some innocent lamb. He deserves every bit of contempt that's being flung at him, especially from everyone whose evenings he's just ruined, Connor included. Connor is really uncomfortable with how much he still feels sorry for Asher, despite these perfectly sound reasons not to.

Luckily Wes, bless his over-large heart, takes the pressure off Connor by being the first to say something. "I believe you. Everyone makes mistakes."

Michaela and Laurel scoff at the same time. Wes shoots them a wide-eyed, earnest look. "I'll stay after work with you," he volunteers. "In solidarity. I know Annalise said only senior staff, but I'll stay to keep you company and try to help out where I can."

It's a ridiculous offer and Wes is too nice to an almost pathological extent—Connor seriously thinks it might be some sort of illness that he should take medication for, it could be life-threatening—but it defuses the situation and the crowd that had gathered starts dispersing. People grumble, but they go back to work, and Asher looks relieved that no one made an attempt on his life. He thanks Wes but Wes won't have it. "Don't worry about it, it'll be fun! I've always wanted to have an after-hours slumber party with my favourite co-workers."

Laurel curses creatively, warns all of them not to dare try to drag her into any fun if they want to keep their fingers, and stomps away.

"Well, I don't know about you guys, but I do actually plan to spend this time catching up on my work. Annalise is right and we need to treat efficiency s a more serious matter," Michaela says, acting like the perfect little teacher's pet. 

The urge to mock her is almost unbearable, but instead of doing that Connor just goes back to work.

Five hours later, night's fallen and everyone who isn't in a senior position or Wes has gone home. Everything is boring as fuck.

"Hey man, I really appreciated what you did," Asher tells Wes for the umpteenth time.

"It's fine, really."

"No, man, I owe you. I'll _repay_ you," he says, double pointing with finger guns at Wes. The way he emphasizes the word repay manages to make it sound kind of sinister and dirty, just because it's coming out of Asher's mouth.

Wes looks alarmed.

"You brought this on yourself," Laurel informs him.

Connor laughs at them, but his attention isn't fully on Wes' suffering. He's put off calling Oliver for as long as he can, and avoiding it any longer would just make the matter worse. He tries to inconspicuously sneak off to a quieter corner, away from the group, and pulls out his cell.

The conversation is unpleasant, because Oliver is sure that Connor is standing him up.

"You don't have to pretend to be polite about it. I just wish you never said anything at all. To get my hopes up."

"No, I swear, my boss is making us stay late," Connor says. It hurts in some way that Connor could've sworn he was immune to, to have Oliver think he's making up an excuse to skip out on dinner. "I'll make it up to you, I promise."

"Don't."

"Oliver..."

"Look, just—you should go back to work, okay?" And with that, he hangs up.

"Boyfriend trouble?" Michaela chirps.

"No. I don't do boyfriends," he replies. He tries to brush her off, go back to work like Oliver said and avoid whatever conversation Michaela's hoping to goad him into.

"Wait, wait, you're gay?" Asher says, loudly.

Connor smirks at him to cover his annoyance that all chances of avoiding the matter at hand have now flown right out the window. At the same time, Laurel asks Asher incredulously about how he could've missed that fact, and Wes launches into an absolutely unnecessary defense of gay people, and Asher backpedals about how he isn't homophobic at all, he loves gay people, and somehow through all that noise Michaela still doesn't forget what she wants to ask Connor.

"Is this not-boyfriend the IT guy I saw you chatting up earlier?" she asks. Thank god she's at least kept her voice fairly quiet. The last thing Connor needs is for Asher to hear about that juicy detail, or worse, for Wes to get it into his head that he needs to help Connor woo him back or something.

"You saw nothing," he snaps.

"Okay." The way she says it makes it sound like she's not letting it go forever, just saving it for a rainy day when she can pull it back out for some good old-fashioned blackmail.

Connor sighs at her. Nothing he can do about it now. Michaela will do whatever Michaela wants to do and Connor has no time to worry about it, because he has to devote all of his spare mental energy to thinking up ways to make it up to Oliver.

* * * 

In the end, the cutest thing he can think of is getting sushi takeout from the most expensive Japanese restaurant downtown and bringing it to Oliver's apartment to beg for forgiveness.

He's not even entirely sure what he needs to be forgiven for, because he's pretty sure he hasn't done anything wrong. Annalise really had made them stay late, and he really hadn't been trying to trick Oliver in any way. All he knows is that this horrible wretched feeling settles in the pit of his stomach whenever he thinks about how Oliver had automatically assumed that Connor had led him on. He'd spent all of last night and all of today carefully avoiding thinking about Oliver possibly crying over him, because he does not have the kind of coping skills necessary to deal with that.

"Really? Sushi in a box?" Oliver says instead of hi. 

He's holding the door only slightly open, just enough for him to stand there, like he's using his body to block Connor. Like he's defending his home from Connor.

Connor Walsh didn't get to where he is in life by giving up that easily.

"Yes, really. Sushi that I will shortly remove from the box, put all over your naked body, and eat off of you without using my hands. Or, I guess you can do it to me instead, if you're hungry."

Oliver rolls his eyes, but the way he does it looks just the tiniest hint of fond, and Connor knows he's got him. 

"It's from Ginza," Connor presses his advantage, waggling his eyebrows in a comically enticing way. "You can be mad at me, but you can't be mad at the sushi. At the very least you should let me in just so it doesn't go to waste."

Oliver bites his lip as he thinks. Connor wants to bite it too.

"Come on," he coaxes. "I owe you dinner."

Oliver mutters a curse under his breath and pauses for just a second more before giving in and stepping aside. Connor pushes through the door before he can change his mind.

They end up not doing the cheesy naked sushi platter thing. Instead, they end up doing something a lot cheesier: they feed it to each other with their hands, sucking soy sauce off each other's fingers and kissing each other between bites. Connor is so happy, he doesn't even recognize himself. It's really fucking good sushi.

They tumble into bed and Connor lets Oliver hold him down when they fuck. He lets Oliver grip his wrists just this side of too hard, and the dull pain throbbing in time with his pulse makes things even better. 

"I wasn't mad," Oliver says, after.

"If you follow that up with 'I was just disappointed,' I'm going to push you off the bed for sounding like my parents," Connor warns.

Oliver swats him. Connor is still buzzing enough from the afterglow of what they'd been doing that the sharp sting of the slap feels good, and he doesn't try to hide his moan; he plays it up and shifts closer against Oliver, rolling them so he pins Oliver down beneath his thigh.

"Stop it," Oliver says with a laugh. "You are shameless. I was trying to be serious."

"You can still be serious while I'm licking your neck, can't you?"

Oliver whines, but he makes no move to push Connor away. "I just...I just want it on record that I'm not a crazy person who gets mad at people for going to work or doing overtime or whatever. I just thought...like, I was sure that you were laughing at me."

"Laughing at you?"

"Yeah, like...you know. With your friends. Laughing about how I was waiting for you when you knew the whole time that you weren't going to follow through. Okay, when I say it out loud it sounds like I have a psychopath's imagination, so let's just pretend I never said anything."

"No, wait, hang on—has that...did someone do that to you?"

"No."

Connor doesn't know Oliver well enough yet to be able to tell if he's lying. Either way, whether or not it's happened before, it's something he expects to happen and Connor tries to bury how much he hates that thought by kissing him deeply. 

They get distracted from the conversation with more kissing, which Oliver seems more than happy about. Connor thinks if he were in Oliver's situation, what he would want most would be to start over and pretend that this awkward rocky patch didn't happen. 

So that's what they do.

They start over, and Connor makes sure to never miss a date again. They get dinner, they watch movies, they go for late night drinks and long walks afterwards. They go to museums and hockey games, and against all of Connor's natural inclinations they sign up for a beginner's pottery class just for something to do. 

Oliver is pretty decent at it, for a guy with zero artistic blood in his body and no eye or talent for design. He manages to make a mug, at least, and it's fully usable and doesn't leak or anything. It even looks kind of nice, in a charmingly amateur way, once he's slapped some glaze on it and fired it. Connor is even more dismal at the whole pottery thing than he predicted, and he was already sure that he would be fucking terrible. He makes a deformed lump of nothing identifiable, paints it all black, and then makes Oliver put it on his mantelpiece. 

"It's art," he tells Oliver.

"It's _hideous_." He says that, but he keeps it on the mantelpiece anyway, next to his cute mug.

On another one of their dates, walking around the farmer's market, Connor buys a cheap little bouquet of dried flowers on an impulse and ends up sticking it in Oliver's handmade mug. The aftermath of their little adventure in ceramics sit there next to each other, a lump and a makeshift vase, contentedly collecting dust.

They also have a lot of sex, obviously. They're so sexually compatible that sometimes Connor has trouble believing that he didn't actually just forget about creating Oliver in a lab specifically to suit his needs, like he's secretly some sort of amnesiac mad scientist. 

He catches himself before he tells Oliver this thought, because it's way too weird to say out loud. Oliver sees him open his mouth but then stop himself, and he asks, "What?"

"Nothing. I was just thinking about how much I hate your face."

"Yeah right, you're obsessed with my face. You want to have my face's babies."

Connor bumps him with his shoulder, and Oliver bumps him back, and they get into a shoulders-only-no-hands-allowed bumping fight that ends with both of them falling off the couch onto the floor. Oliver trying to stop himself from having a full-blown laughing fit and Connor watches the rapid rise and fall of his chest, wondering how he could possibly find it so damn endearing.

At work, Michaela drops passive aggressive hints about how much more cheerful Connor is these days, how much nicer he is to be around. Laurel agrees and Wes just beams at him. Asher mostly asks him a lot about whether he finds him attractive, but at least he doesn't instigate another massive security breach, so that's really all they can ask of him. They go whole months porn-free at the bank, and most people more or less forgive Asher, and once again he is allowed to invite himself into their offices or join in on their lunches without asking.

Before Connor knows it, he's been with Oliver for longer than he's been with anybody in his adult life. Their relationship has progressed into what's essentially uncharted territory for him. He knows, vaguely, from watching other people, that they're supposed to be getting serious and probably having some important conversations about The Future and all that. But he has no idea how what he's supposed to say or do, and some days he's not even totally sure he has any idea what exactly he wants from the future. 

So he just keeps going as they've been doing all this time, long past the socially acceptable period when they should at least discuss if they want to make it official and call each other boyfriends or partners. He puts it off for so long that finally Oliver, whom nobody would ever peg for the first one to initiate anything, can't stand it anymore and brings it up himself.

He brings it up in a very Oliver way, casual and gentle and over dinner, apropos of nothing. There are a few false starts and quite a bit of stuttering, and eventually he just blurts out, "Are we exclusive?"

He interprets Connor's slightly-too-long pause very, very wrongly.

Connor is just caught off guard, for multiple reasons. He's never been asked such a question before. Before Oliver, he'd never chosen to be with anyone who would even want to ask him such a question, much less heavily imply that they want the answer to be yes. He's also just plain not expecting it right this second, and after he swallows the bite of rice that's been in his mouth, he goes for a sip of wine, so he can have another moment to think and get his bearings. But he's made it too obvious that he's stalling, and Oliver's face falls.

"Falls" might actually be an understatement. Oliver's face _crumples_ , and before Connor can get a word in edgewise he says, "Oh. You don't...I thought...just. Oh." He pushes away from the dining table and all but runs to the bathroom.

"Oh for fuck's sake," Connor mutters to himself, throwing his napkin down and running after him.

He rattles the knob but he already knew the door would be locked. "Babe, come on, you're being ridiculous."

"Am I?" Oliver yells through the door, angry and gearing himself up to get hysterical soon. Connor recognizes the subtleties in his tone well enough to know how to tell by now. 

"Unlock the door and we'll talk about it, okay?"

"Talk about what? The fact that I was stupid enough to think this was something real, something that was going go last, when this whole time you've been fucking other people?"

Connor does not fail to notice that Oliver is already using 'was,' past tense, like he thinks it's all over. He tamps down on the panic response flipping around in his stomach by rolling his eyes instead. Oliver is just being dramatic. He always is, about these kinds of things. Connor can talk him down from it, and then everything will be fine. It has to be.

"Are you even listening to yourself right now? Why the hell would I fuck other people? _When_ the hell would I fuck other people, even? When I'm not at work, I'm with you. We spend all our spare time together, and unless you honestly think I sneak off for quickies with strangers when I tell you I need to use the restroom or something, I wouldn't have time to have an affair even if I wanted one. And, like, how would I even have leftover energy for sex with other people, when you wear me out just about every single night, hmm?" His tone is teasing, cajoling. He wants Oliver to see how silly this all is, because how could Connor want anyone else, anything else, when he has Oliver right there.

There's nothing but silence on the other side of the door.

"Oliver. Come on. You know I would never do that to you."

The door finally, finally unlocks, and Oliver steps out, looking a bit red around the eyes. "So you're only faithful to me because we have so much sex that you couldn't get it up for someone else even if you tried?"

Connor breathes an internal sigh of relief. Joking is good. Joking means he isn't mad anymore, or about to do something stupid like break up with him. "Absolutely," he answers without missing a beat. "I mean, it is a lot of sex. So much sex. There isn't enough semen in my body left for anyone else."

Oliver wrinkles his nose and makes a vomiting sound effect. Connor hugs him. Tight.

"I do want to be exclusive. I have been exclusive. I want us to be exclusive with each other, forever and ever," he says into Oliver's neck. The last bit is said lightly, as a joke, because right now he doesn’t really want to examine how much he might actually mean that. 

"Okay, good," Oliver replies, hugging him back. 

They hold onto each other for a bit, but then Connor pulls back and holds Oliver at arm's length, forcing him to make eye contact with him. "There's no one I want more than you, but you gotta stop always assuming the worst, or assuming that I'm going to do awful things to you behind your back. It isn't healthy, for this relationship or for your general state of mind."

"I know," Oliver says, biting his bottom lip. "I really do. It's just like...sometimes it's hard to believe that this isn't all a long set up for a prank somehow, because you're...how can you be real? It's too good."

"Oh trust me, I know. Sometimes I imagine that I'm actually a mad scientist who designed you in a lab and then erased my own memories of that so I can live in blissful ignorance with this perfect guy who is exactly everything I want."

"...What? That's weird."

"It's not any weirder than you still thinking that it's a prank and I laugh at you behind your back with my bank friends. You've met my bank friends. They're terrible people. I'd much rather laugh at them behind their backs with you."

Oliver gives a grudging little chuckle, which of course sounds like the most perfect song in the world because obviously Connor designed him in a lab to be everything he likes.

"How about," Connor suggests, "from now on, whenever we have doubts or if we feel like things are too good to be true, we talk to each other instead of making up crazy theories in our heads?"

"Deal," Oliver promises.

They seal it with a kiss.

* * *

Eventually, Asher manages to wrap his mind around the astounding idea that Connor is both gay and not attracted to him. It takes a long time. He has a supernaturally bulletproof ego, considering how often Michaela and Laurel to shoot holes into it. 

Eventually, Asher stops asking for his opinion about his clothes or his hair or, the absolute worst, his butt. Instead, he asks him about Oliver sometimes, and their relationship. On a good day, Connor might even be inclined to consider Asher somewhat of a friend. And so, as friends do, he ends up telling him about when he and Oliver first got together. 

"I sort of became obsessed with him the first time he came around to fix our computers, after you managed to melt down the whole system right when our IT guy was on vacation," he says. It's been long enough now that it's slightly less embarrassing to admit out loud to another person that he had a weirdly intense crush on Oliver before they even really knew each other. "We saw each other again about a week later, at a bar, and that was when we first hooked up."

"Was he good?" Asher interrupts.

"Ew, never ask me that about my boyfriend, ever again."

"He was, wasn't he?"

"Anyway," Connor presses on firmly, "the next day you clicked some stupid email thing and fried our computers again, and I had his number right there in my phone, so I called him up again and he came over to fix everything a second time."

"Wait, so he came to fix all our computers because you _seduced_ him?" Asher asks incredulously, because he's terrible at listening. That isn't what Connor said _at all_.

"No, that isn't what I said at all," he protests. "The seducing was just sort of incidental. How do you not remember this? It was literally all your fault. He had already helped us before I even did anything. He was just so—there was something between us, just, chemistry or something, and one thing led to another and honestly, I don't even know why I bother telling you things. Every single time I think you might understand something, you go and prove me wrong."

"That was a bit of overkill, don't you think?" Asher goes on like he didn't hear Connor. "I mean, it was just some viruses, I'm sure we would've found some other IT firm to deal with it eventually, you didn't need to sleep with a guy just to make our emails stop bouncing."

And of course, because Connor's life is a fucking joke, Oliver chooses that moment to clear his throat and announce his presence in their break room.

He's angry, and he is also the king of interpreting things in precisely the exact way that would hurt himself the most, and so of course he thinks Connor just told Asher that he fucked him just to get their computers fixed. Oliver turns on his heel and leaves.

Connor rushes out after him, cursing Asher. It's always fucking Asher who gets him into these messes. It's completely, entirely unfair. That's not even close to what happened at all, and now Oliver thinks it is because Asher is an utter douchehole who deserves his lonely friendless existence.

He grabs Oliver by the arm before he makes it back out onto the floor; they're still behind the scenes, in the staff offices area where the general public won't be there to watch them fight. Annalise would be so pleased, if it weren't for the part where she would much more likely be so annoyed. Connor looks around for her, doesn't see her, and quickly drags Oliver into the men's restroom for some modicum of privacy.

Oliver glowers at him, looks down pointedly at Connor's fingers gripping his arm with talon-like intensity, and then glowers some more. Connor lets go. "Don't be mad," he says, in a vain attempt to head him off before he even starts.

"Too late," Oliver informs him.

"You know how Asher is, he runs his mouth all the time and says crazy things. That wasn't what I said at all, that wasn't even what happened at all. You should know! You were there!!" Connor is trying not to yell because they are in the goddamned employee bathroom, but he can't control the way his voice rises. This is not how he pictured his day would go.

"What the hell kind of conversation were you even having, why were you even talking about the first time we had sex?"

"Because you're my boyfriend! You're the longest term boyfriend I've ever had! You're the only boyfriend I've ever had if you want to get technical, the only one who counts for anything. And how you got together with your serious boyfriend is the kind of story you tell your friends over lunch."

Oliver looks less pissed off, but still not fully convinced. "You're calling Asher a friend now?"

"When he's not being a massive dick. Obviously not right now, right now he is definitely not my friend." Connor runs a hand through his hair. He's got this. Everything's under control and Oliver's not going to break up with him over something Asher paraphrased badly. That would be stupid, and Oliver isn't stupid. Everything's fine. "Come on, remember that deal we made? You promised you'd try to stop doing that thing where you think the worst of me."

Oliver looks down, scuffing the toe of his shoe on the tile floor. "You're right," he says quietly. "I know. I'm sorry. It's just...maybe I'm being irrational right now because hearing that kind of hurt my feelings and I want you to make me feel better."

Well, Connor can certainly rise to that challenge. "There is absolutely zero percent of truth in what you heard Asher say, because I was obsessed with you for the whole week before I even saw you at that bar. I've never told you this, but I actually went there to try to forget about you. And then you were the first person I saw when I walked in, and it was like...destiny." Connor huffs out a nervous laugh, because he hates how cheesy that word sounds. "Or, like it was meant to be, I don't know. Did you know that after the first time you came to fix our computers, I was so worried I'd never see you again that I thought about deliberately re-infecting our system with viruses from gay porn sites? Just so you'd have to come back, and, like, so it would be clear to you that I am indeed gay. I thought about telling you that night, like 'hi, my name is Connor, I like you so much that I almost deliberately put hardcore barebacking anal on my work computer just for an excuse to talk to you.'"

Oliver furrows his eyebrows at him. "What, like, as a pickup line...?"

"Maybe. Would it have worked?" 

"I don’t know. I think maybe anything would've worked. I had been thinking about you too."

Connor's eyes widen. That is brand new information. "Come again? I thought you didn't notice me. I spent the whole week mentally stalking you and feeling bad about it because I was certain that you didn't even know I existed!"

"How could I not notice you, you were staring at me the entire time I was working! I was so scared that I'd do everything wrong, I was nervous as fuck because I didn't want you to think I was an idiot!" 

"I think I was staring because it might have been love at first sight." 

"Don't use that word when we're fighting. That is not a good first time to use it." 

"Are we fighting? Still?" 

Oliver sighs, but Connor is pretty sure he's just doing it to cover up the giddy warmth creeping into every molecule of is body, because that's sure as fuck why Connor is schooling his expression into studied nonchalance. "I guess not really," Oliver says.

"Okay. So it was love at first sight then, alright?"

Oliver can't hold back his grin anymore and it breaks across his face like sunbeams after a storm. 

Of course, Asher is blessed (and the rest of the world cursed) with an uncanny sense of unfortunate timing, and before Connor can really savour this rather ground-breaking moment in their relationship and indeed in his own personal growth, Asher waltzes into the actual bathroom like the human embodiment of inappropriate behaviour.

"Oh good, you've made up," he says, after taking a moment to size up the situation. "So Walsh here has explained how you wouldn't even know who he is if it weren't for me bringing you together like the hand of fate, right? Your whole relationship actually owes its existence to me. I'm a goddamn matchmaker, a cupid and a hero."

"Um," Oliver says.

"Excuse me, what the hell are you doing?" Connor says.

"I came to back you up! You're my man, bro! I saw what was going down and I didn't want you to get framed for a crime you didn't commit!"

Oliver quirks an eyebrow at him, and Connor thinks, fuck my life. "Okay, fine, whatever, you're a good friend or something, now go away."

Asher double fist pumps like an actual douchebag. How is this guy even real? 

"As a good friend, how about you cover for me and say I got sudden and severe food poisoning? Because I'm going to take off for the rest of the day." Connor reaches out and takes a hold of Oliver's hand, slotting their fingers together as perfectly as a man-made jigsaw puzzle, or indeed a lab-created scientific invention just meant to work that way. "I need to take my boyfriend home immediately and tell him I love him properly."

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to the wonderful anonymous commenter who left me this very inspiring prompt over on [my tumblr](http://riseagainphoenix.tumblr.com). My apologies for not following it exactly--the story got away from me! I also feel a desperate need to note that this imaginary bank's really truly terrible computer security was just a plot device for the sake of the story. In the real world, I don't think any bank could be that vulnerable without violating privacy laws. Let's just hand-wave that inaccuracy because "everybody goes to jail" would be an entirely different AU.


End file.
